The Fat Angel Sings

White Denim, one of the very best rock bands to emerge this millennium, have gone through rapid changes in the 2020s, and now open an exciting new chapter with the wondrous album, ’12’, which arrives rich in hot tunes and fresh invention.

It’s always been hard to keep pace with James Petralli’s group, ever since they first exploded out of Austin, Texas in ’08 with hyper-kinetic post-punk bangers like “Shake Shake Shake” and “I Start To Run”. There was delicious romance in the original trio’s MO, as they hatched intrepid sounds together via lengthy jams in a 1940s Spartan trailer parked up in woodland outside the city. James duly raced on through shifting line-ups and kaleidoscopic shades of soul, jazz and Southern rock, always with a feel of in-the-moment authenticity.

As for so many musicians, the pandemic forced Petralli into a radical rethink in both life and creative process. Going into White Denim’s twelfth long-player, he relocated his family to Los Angeles, and, barred from the usual workouts “on the floor” with his latest group members under COVID, he plunged deep into the science of assembling tracks digitally, with contributions from players he’d sometimes never even meet.

The results on “12” are intricate, hi-tech and forward-facing, yet also somehow still of a piece with the questing ambition, rootsy swing and uplifting way with melody we’ve come to adore about Petralli’s music. 

Bonus CD – Contains 6 live outtakes from the “12” recording sessions, including the singles ‘Light On’ and ‘Second Dimensions’ along with a cover of Prefab Sprouts classic ‘When Love Breaks Down’.

“Sniff More Gritty’ is an album of many faces, some belonging to Du Blonde, others belonging to a host of characters from past loves, to record industry executives, each played with humour and heartbreak in a one-man pantomime of glam-rock, punk, and a single, acrylic nail adorned middle finger. The glimmers of pop teased on 2021’s acclaimed ‘Homecoming’ LP become firework displays that illuminate stories of missed connections, anxiety, controlling relationships and hard earned peace. In spite of darkness, Du Blonde is choosing fun.

Having self-produced her third album, after years of working relationships with record labels and industry producers, Du Blonde found herself able to finally express herself musically in a way that her previous situation would not allow. The freedom that came with her move to production and engineering opened up a new sonic world for Du Blonde, one that is arguably catchier, more colourful and more exciting than anything she had been allowed to bring forth previously. 

“Sniff More Gritty” is entirely performed (drums aside!), engineered and produced by Du Blonde, and also features unique collaborations with Skunk Anansie’s Skin, Against Me!’s Laura Jane Grace, Maximo Park’s Paul Smith and The Futureheads’ Ross Millard, with additional mixing by Sam Grant of Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs.

When life gives you anthropomorphic whistling lemons, why not write a song? One late night, post-restaurant shift, Imogen Badrock (vocals/synth) and Josh Yeung (guitar/vocals) acted on a bleary-eyed creative urge that resulted in a goofy demo about an organic lemonade drink, sparking the formation of the Manchester dream-pop troupe now known as Umarells. After bringing in bassist Ryan Marsden and drummer Sarah Knowles, Umarells sealed the deal as a quartet during a group trip to Blackpool Pleasure Beach, a thrill-seekers’ “dystopia” that will forever hold a special, sugar-coated place in their hearts. “All roads lead to Blackpool,” they joke.

Now with the addition of lead guitarist Fuchsia Summerfield, Umarells—their name taken from a very specific Italian word for retired men who watch construction sites—arrange pieces of post-hardcore, shoegaze, Midwest emo, and ‘00s indie-psych into reflections on grief, loss, and failed relationships, all shot through with ocean-deep introspection and mixed by Alex Greaves (bdrmm, Working Men’s Club). One of the band’s earlier offerings, “Closer” considers “the state of dreaming and how it’s all disconnected and unusual,” explains Badrock, while “One More Day” is about “one of our really close friends and missing them,” says Yeung. “It’s a dedication.”

“Another day without you / Another week without you / Another month without you / Can’t take the days without you,” sings Badrock in her incandescent coo on the EP’s standout title track, a loving portrait of friendship filtered through the lens of pillow-soft indie-pop.

For “Ocean,” Badrock worked a little magic with her Korg synth to conjure a wave of washed-out textures in thrall to the song’s watery namesake. “I sort of envisioned the sea coming in and out,” she explains. “Connected with Josh’s melancholy guitar playing, it’s about the breakdown of a relationship and those moments when you’re just looking out at the ocean and reflecting on everything.”

The diaristic trajectory continues on twinkling indie-pop dreamscape “You’re Not Here,” which was released as the band’s debut single for FOMO in November 2023 and is described as a “bit of a liberation song.” Badrock says: “I wrote this when I felt free of a relationship and able to do as I please without being told I couldn’t. As the song builds at the end it’s a cathartic release of the past, a bit of an ode to a siren.”

Ultimately, the band’s soaring autobiographical missives form the widescreen soundtrack to their lives, and film fan Marsden would love for one of their songs to be featured in a movie. “I guess we’d probably suit like a Lost in Translation-type-film, something artsy and emotional. 

*SIGNED PRINT EDITION* After forming on a group trip to Blackpool, Manchester-based quartet Umarells have announced their debut EP ‘One More Day’ via Fear of Missing Out Records. The record circles peaks, plummets, and upside-down turns for a front-row seat on the emotional Big Dipper of life. The faded sparkle of the Blackpool seaside trails through five postcards of smouldering indie-rock on the EP.

Formed in Bristol, 4-piece Lice have become one of UK experimental rock’s most inventive and ambitious outliers. Their second album ‘Third Time At The Beach’ – a three-part epic exploring our struggle to better understand the world around us – arrives on the 20th September via AD 93. Darting between minimalism, rock, techno and more, it sends us hurtling us through time and space: featuring a cast of astronauts, cavemen and dinosaurs.

 Their second album “Third Time At The Beach” – a three-part epic exploring our struggle to better understand the world around us – arrives via AD 93. Darting between minimalism, rock, techno and more, it sends us hurtling us through time and space: featuring a cast of astronauts, cavemen and dinosaurs.

“Third Time At The Beach’s” concept is expressed through three movements. The first (‘Unscrewed’, ‘White Tubes’, ‘Red Fibres’) presents the child being introduced to the world, hammered into shape through prevailing culture, and realising they have reached adulthood with a blinkered understanding of the world. The second (‘To The Basket’, ‘Wrapped In A Sheet’, ‘Scenes From The Desert’, ‘Mown In Circles’) is a disorientating, alien sequence: reevaluating fundamental concepts including money, time, nationhood and language. In the third (‘Fatigued, Confused’, ‘Third Time At The Beach’, ‘The Dance’), the individual embraces these new ideas – granting them a changed understanding of the world, and more agency in the path they take through it.

This is the former Rilo Kiley frontwoman’s third solo album & documents her struggle to cope following the death of her estranged father in 2010 and the subsequent break-up of Rilo Kiley. ‘The Voyager’ finds the always relatable songwriter at her sharp-witted best, singing about her experiences with honesty and incisiveness.

The 10th Anniversary reissue of the 2014 album featuring “Just One of the Guys”, “The Voyager”, “She’s Not Me” and more on Translucent Sea Blue vinyl. This is the former Rilo Kiley frontwoman’s third solo album and documents her struggle to cope following the death of her estranged father in 2010 and the subsequent break-up of Rilo Kiley. “The Voyager” finds the always relatable songwriter at her sharp-witted best, singing about her experiences with honesty and incisiveness

“The Voyager’s” 10th anniversary limited edition translucent sea-blue vinyl is available now exclusively in the US at indie record stores!

After a hiatus from touring, Black Pumas returned to the road in 2024 in support of their acclaimed sophomore album “Chronicles of a Diamond. “Live From Brooklyn Paramount” captures the “Electric Church” live experience created by Eric Burton, Adrian Quesada and their six-piece band.

The first single “Know You Better” is out now! You can pre-order the album today on webstore exclusive Sauvignon vinyl (limited to 300 copies), Brooklyn Brownstone vinyl, and CD,

The 2xLP set features songs from both Chronicles and their million-selling debut, including the Grammy nominated “Colors”, “Black Moon Rising”, “More Than A Love Song” & their version of Tracy Chapman’s “Fast Car.”

releases November 22nd, 2024

According to the press release “an incredible feeling of freedom and escapism” dominates the fourth full-length by Welsh electronic music artist Kelly Lee Owens, so the title “Dreamstate” does make a lot of sense. Compared to the experimental 2022 “LP.8” and the slightly darker and also fittingly titled “Inner Songs” from 2020, this new body of work is indeed a bit more euphoric and positive. It’s an album that celebrates the power of the four-to-the-floor beat while also showcasing the artist’s profound songwriting skills. “Dark Angel” does open the album slightly more atmospheric but the title track and its bubbling acid bassline make sure that Kelly Lee Owens’ work is still rooted on the club floor.

The tremendous singles “Love You Got” and “Higher” continue to deliver that hands-in-the-air-euphoria before a few more mellow songs slow the tempo a bit down in the middle of the record. 

What I enjoy about “Dreamstate” is not just the wonderful production and the angel-like voice of its creator, but the aspect that it works extremely well as a coherent record.

There’s a flow that combines all these different worlds. Still, I wouldn’t label the record as a pure club album. Sure, there are more straightforward bangers like the terrific “Air” but these songs also work in different contexts. It’s an album full of energy, a battery full of ideas and love. “I do my best to stay open,” she sings on the relaxing “Ballad (In the End)” and that repetitive mantra resonates a lot with me these days, I have to say. With this new album Kelly Lee Owens cements her status as one of electronic music’s finest contemporary players. Björk, Jon Hopkins and Depeche Mode are already fans and I am as well. So, follow the advice of us all and enter a very special “Dreamstate” right here.

Seated stage right at a lone electronic keyboard, for almost the first half of his two-hour set at a busy Alexandra Palace Theatre, Joe Jackson looked a bit like a particularly accomplished busker. Playing in front of a crimson curtain on an entirely unadorned stage, the production was as intimate as it was economical. The sense, though, that this was a one-man band touring the country on the cheap, perhaps in a hire car, didn’t survive the appearance of a nine-piece brass-and-strings ensemble for a second-half run through with a selection of entirely unusual music. In the past, Joltin’ Joe has turned his hands to jazz, soul, pop, rock and classical; these days, however, and with some gusto, he’s trained his sights on early 20^th century-style music hall.

As befits this most singular of artists, the show was kind of backwards. In the normal telling, artists of a certain age dispense with their newer material first before rewarding the audience with hits from the past. Up at Ally Pally, though, Jackson unfurled the bangers early doors. “On Your Radio”, “Real Men” and “It’s Different For Girls“, hits from the days when the Portsmouth-reared songwriter was mislabelled an ‘Angry Young Man’, helped bring the crowd to life. Minutes later, the sound of his relentless left hand pumping out the bass line to mega-smash “Steppin’ Out” suggested that time and tide have yet to leave a mark on an artist who recently celebrated 70 circuits of the sun. His voice, too, was in sensational shape. 

In lesser hands, the second half might not have worked quite so well as he launched into songs from last year’s album, “What a Racket”, as his fictional alter ego, music hall performer Max Champion. For some, the sight and sound of a tuba player, a flutist, trumpeters, violinists, a double bassist, and more, could have easily been a gear change too many.

But holding court centre stage, dressed in a stovepipe hat and tails, Jackson was a convincing roustabout. At a venue nicknamed “the People’s Palace”, Jackson brought love and expertise to what otherwise might have been a testing second act. Deservedly, before the encore, he and the players received a standing ovation. 

Even Joe Jackson, though, isn’t quite bloody-minded enough to leave the stage without a final nod to his illustrious back catalogue. In the past, “Is She Really Going Out With Him?“, his first single, from 1978, has been interpreted in ways that include acapella, pop and a sparse-sounding kind of soul. Never before, though, has it been sculpted in a way that would have been recognisable to music hall stagers such as Millie Lindon and Whit Cunliffe. In his refusal to bow to the powerful gravity of nostalgia, as he finished his night’s work, Jackson deserved the applause that rained upon him. 

Joe Jackson plays Alexandra Palace Theatre